some days I forget what I cried for in winter.
my peach pit of stomach has grown

into fruit, warmed by hours of snare-drum
laughter in the crabgrass. now I wrap myself

in june’s yarn-ball of heat. our september
love buried itself in who was good—who did

the laundry on tuesday? who scraped spaghetti
sauce from last night’s plates? some days I laughed

like a piano. some days I could sleep until noon.
some days I survived on only bread and warm wind.

one late night I held fistfuls of black hair while she
emptied her belly of wine and I thought the curve

of her spine was asking me something: why are you here
when you could be anywhere and everywhere else?

november curled itself around my spine like smoke
from a cigarette and december froze into gray web.

now I can fall asleep without a blanket.
my water-dreams loop, warm like waves,

and some days I can wake before the sun. I no longer
wonder if it’s you I’m supposed to miss. in january,

I felt my ribs splinter like the weather-worn panes
of her bedroom window, but now real life is loud again

and birds have wings that aren’t knives. some days
I can laugh like a hot griddle. some nights I want to sleep

naked in moon-cooled dirt. when rain coasts down our side
of the mountain, I spin circles in the downpour. my freckled

limbs light a wild frenzy in the darkness, my bare
shoulders beg the question mark of the valley for more.